The Bloated Crapfest That Was May

Damn it, folks.

This month very well may have been the busiest in our family's history.

Evident by the nearly 150 pictures and videos in this month's randoms, which doesn't even include any of the documentation from all the major shit we had going on this month, all of which got their own, individual posts - the Loons Suite, Prom, Orchestra Concerts, Collierpalooza, Memorial Day, Cedar Point, Cannonball's Graduation, etc. etc. 

We kept so busy during this month that it seemingly went by in about five minutes. Before we knew it, it was basically June. The school year was over, summer was here, and we had our first-ever high school graduate on our hands. It was a whirlwind, and while parts of it were stressful and we didn't have much time to catch our breath at all, there was a lot of fun involved and quite a few things that, given the opportunity to look back on pics and remember them one at a time, we can look back upon later and be like, "oh, that was a milestone."

So yeah, May was nuts. Behold. . .

Kris, once again messing with my Amazon Music algorithm in the month of April. . .

Woke up one early weekday morning to find this barricade erected outside the girls' bathroom. . .

Courtesy of the Cannonball. Why did she want us to use hairspray to kill it? Did she expect us to make a bootleg flame-thrower or something?

Alayna and Sebastian. . . somewhere.

These three recreating a pic from their freshman year Homecoming, showing off their nails (this time for their senior prom.)

Alayna took this while hanging out with the dog in her room one morning.

We find a lot of Tik Tok dance vids on Abby's phone (this one looks like it was taken in Orchestra one day at school.)

Kris finally finished her paint-by-numbers elephant painting that she's been chipping away at since, like, Christmas.

A sad day. Towards the beginning of the month, the workhorse at my school - which has faithfully served day in and day out in my teachers lounge for decades - finally crapped out. I came in one morning and throughout the hallways outside the lounge (near my classroom) all you could smell was electrical burning, so I had our building secretary contact maintenance to check it out. Turns out the old girl was finally dead - it was like losing a loved one.

Abby and one of the many clubs she's involved with at Midland High (not sure if this is Journalism or Model UN or something else.)

Went over to Mitch's one weekend night to have a few beers with some of the other Kings of the Hill, and Mitch had a few random beers in his fridge that he was looking to pawn off on guests (he doesn't really drink Craft beer, but keeps it readily available for people he's hosting.) This one was pretty decent, but you definitely wouldn't want more than one of them in a sitting - pretty rich.

Mitch installed this pots-and-pans hook system under his gazebo to use for hanging up people's mugs. He's keeping Collier's nearly-dead kegorator, and his idea is for folks to keep personalized tankards, steins, etc. over at his house to use whenever they come over. So far only Cory and him and mugs hanging up, but we're all wanting to get ones soon in order to take advantage of this system.

Watching the Tigers lose. Again.

Another time lapse video of Abby at work.

Ended the night with a small pour of some hard-to-find bourbon Mitch had lying around. He collects high-end whiskeys like I collect vinyl. 

The next night, some of the couples in the Tribe drove out to the Pickvets' place in Auburn. Their kids go to Bay City Western, and they were hosting an after-party for the school's prom (which was the weekend after Midland's.) They figured it'd be fun to have some adults on hand to help bring some sanity to an otherwise house full of high schoolers, I guess. The moms set up camp around their dining room table, while the dads hung out on the back porch (like Holty, Lonnie and Erik here.)

Cory and Collier

Eventually it got too cold out to continue hanging out on the back patio, so we migrated indoors and they killed some time watching basketball in the living room. You know, my personal favorite.

Hens, clucking.

The next morning was Mother's Day, and Kris kicked off her special day with having a coffee on the back patio, taking advantage of an unseasonably warm Sunday morning.

Abby gets a selfie with the day's main character. The girls and I got Kris tickets to see Brandi Carlisle (see my Amazon Music monthly insight pic from earlier) at Pine Knob sometime in July or August (I forget the specifics) with some of her friends.

The Cannonball and Sophie, driving around somewhere.

The following day, Alayna had the Seniors Orchestra Banquet over at Northwood University. They put out food and pass out awards to all the Seniors who stuck it out through Orchestra and Choir throughout their high school careers, and this included Alayna and Cristina (who took advantage of a photo op thingy outside the banquet area.)

(Abby was at work.)

Ms. Mammassian, presenting the Cannonball with her Orchestra award.

Like her parents and sister before her, Abby has taken over duties at the drive-thru window at her work. It runs in the family.

Alayna picked up Abby from her shift (with Samson along for morale support I assume.)

These two can be found on the living couch more often than not.

Hit this epic milestone one morning while driving through Freeland on my way to work. Stopped at a red light, I happened to glance down randomly and about had a heart attack - felt I was obligated to document this momentous occasion.

That Thursday, later in the week, Kris took the day off to accompany Alayna to SVSU for a Student Orientation Day (or open house, something along those lines.) Basically parents and future students get to tour the campus and attend multiple informational mini-seminars that dive into various aspects of the college and what students can expect while attending there (financial aid crap, campus layout, various programs, etc.)

Stoked for the day.

Kris took a pic of the inside of this building. I have no idea where it is or why she took this.

Abby and Ella at Pom Practice one evening.

(I assume this is for Snapchat.)

Dance party with the dog ('cause why not.)

Sebastian bought a Corvette this month, seeing how he's a huge car guy (he's going to college for it right now), and drove it over so Alayna could check it out.

About to take it out for a spin - Alayna is a HUGE fan of this car.

Later that evening, watching TV in the living room (where you can find us from like 8:30-9:30pm every school night.)

The last monthly installment of The Focus (Midland High's school newspaper) for this year. Abby was recently promoted to an editor for the coming school year, so she was pretty excited about that. Here's her and Brooklyn (she always gets tons of pics posing with the paper with fellow Focus contributors.

Abby and Jazzy (another Pom teammate.)

A pic with the teacher who oversees the publication (I forget his name.)

And, as always, a group pic of the entire editorial staff.

Why is Abby drawing pics of herself as Michael Jackson on her Geometry tests?

Posing in her new SVSU sweatshirt (Kris may have gone nuts in the campus bookstore) and her boyfriend's flashy, new sports car.

Not sure why everyone was posing next to this Chemics statue outside the school one afternoon. Didn't get the memo on this one.

Kicking off a weekday Pom Practice with some. . . Yoga?

The second (or third, who knows - this month was a blur) Friday of the month, Alayna and all the upper-crust students of her graduating class attended an awards ceremony at Central Auditorium, where students were awarded various scholarships and acknowledged for making the Honor Roll throughout High School. First all the Honor Roll students came up onto the stage and were awarded for their academic excellence (Alayna shown here grabbing hers.) 

Later on in the ceremony, students were called back up and given special scholarships. Alayna and this other girl named Claire were awarded the Hailey Mae Scholarship, named after their classmate who was tragically killed a year or two ago in a freak car accident on M-20. The family started the scholarship fund to award students who are pursuing female-related health issues in the medical field (Alayna is looking to pursue a career in breath radiology.)

Posing with the scholarship awards, following the ceremony.

Hailey's mom also put together little gift boxes for the scholarship winners, which included bright pink ropes to wear over the caps and gowns (Hailey's favorite color) along with daisy pins (her favorite flower.) I already discussed in the Graduation post that while Midland High's principal was totally fine with making an exception to the district policy for this (the district is very strict about what students can wear over the gowns for the commencement) the school board was like, 'absolutely not.' But punk rock runs strong in this family, and Alayna rocked the pink ropes anyway.

The next morning, Erik and I met up with four other guys from Lodge to once again take part in the annual Midland Blooms event (where various businesses and organizations throughout town all get together and plant flowers along Eastman Road.)

It had been raining heavily for hours, but had let up - miraculously - right before we were to get started with planting flowers.

As always, we had the prime, corner spot on St. Andrews and Eastman, right across the street from the library.

We finished in about an hour, which I believe is record time for us.

While we were away doing this, our kids were somewhere downstate for another Model UN summit (or whatever the hell they're called. . .)

Following our good deed for the day, Erik and I drove over to The Bully for a celebratory Bloody Mary (they make the best in town, it's basically a meal in a glass.)

Kris bought yet another water bottle. She has a problem.

Abby and Ella enjoy taking pics with new people they meet at these UN thingies. I have no idea where this is or who this other kid is.

Abby, Ella, and some other kids participating in the UN. . . stuff.

More Model US selfies. . .

Posing with some random-ass kid.

That afternoon, the Cannonball invited a bunch of people over to our house so Sebastian and his twin brother could grill up hundreds of brats. Teenage boys will eat their weight in meat, folks.

While they were upstairs doing this, I retreated down to the Captain's Quarters for another nerdy session of DnD with the old 1214 crew: BP (a sorcerer), Russell (the Dungeon Master, as well as a paladin), Mikey (a warlock), Learman (a fighter), and Yours Truly (a rogue thief.)

Optimal nerd set up. I use my silver Chromebook for taking notes, referencing my character sheet, etc., while my desktop computer is the Discord video chat screen, and the second Chromebook runs the map and dice-rolling app (also on Discord.)

Trying this one out, half-way through the evening's five-hour session. Not bad at all, but I probably wouldn't get it again (not a huge fan of the nuttiness of porters, I prefer stouts.)

Again, I always thought of DnD as some super-nerdy bullshit dorks played, and therefore avoided it like the plague for decades. But, when my old college buddies reached out and asked me to join, I relented. . . and HOLY SHIT is it fun. Nerdy or not, these five hour sessions of ours go by in like five minutes.

Meanwhile, back upstairs, Alayna and Sebastian got another selfie while hanging out with folks in our backyard.

Towards the end of the night (Russell suffers from crappy bandwidth from his office location in his garage, so he'll sometimes cut his vid feed in order to avoid lagging the audio.)

Cozying up with Samson on a weeknight, the following week.

That week, on a random evening after work, Alayna and the other seniors in orchestra had one, final performance for their parents. Kind of an intimate, informal thing where they pick two of their favorite songs from their time in orchestra, and play together one last time. They went with two from their middle school years at Northeast. . .

These songs were so short and simple that, for the first time in a long time, I'm able to share videos of actual orchestra performances here on this blog of ours. . .

The violin seniors.

One, last group pic. And yes, Kris cried at this, too.

The next day, nabbing a quick selfie in chemistry class with Nica.

And, later that day, at Pom Practice.

In the middle of all this month's crazy, Abby somehow turned 16. We went out to dinner for her actual birthday (at Logan's Steakhouse), but didn't do anything else 'cause it was on a random Thursday (she'd be having a party with friends two days later on that Saturday.)

Kris' irises are coming in strong this year - they line the entirety of our back beds along the house.

With only a few days remaining in the school year for Yours Truly, my students have begun graffiti'ing up my classroom whiteboard.

Out to lunch (MHS is open campus) with Brooklyn and Lena.

Not sure how much learning actually goes on in schools nowadays, all I see is picture-taking.

Who brings a birthday cake to school?

That Friday, Kris and I started decorating the house for Abby's Sweet 16. We got this balloon arch up in no time, we're old hands at this by now.

Abby made up these digital invites to send out to her friends. She had invited like eighteen girls, but there was some other event going on and a bunch of the girls couldn't end up making it, so she ended up with like seven or eight girls that came and went throughout the day.

Kris had this cake made up at Meijer, based on a pic Abby sent her that she had stumbled upon on Instagram or some shit. Turned out exactly like the pic, so her and Kris were pretty excited.

Not sure what's happening here. Part of the getting-ready process, I assume.

The birthday girl.

Putting out the spread. Kris got a big sandwich platter from Costco (or something), along with a bunch of snacky foods that the girls could graze on throughout the day/night (this thing started at 2pm and ran until well past midnight.)

This mooch hung out in the kitchen all damn day, patiently waiting for scraps to appear on the floor.

Kids start to arrive, and do what all Gen Z'ers prefer to do in social settings - stare at their phones.

Settling in for some charm bracelet craft thingy all the girls wanted to do.

Abby's handiwork.

Singing Happy Birthday to Abzilla.

Following cake and ice cream, some kids took off and the rest migrated to the living room, where at first why just batted around balloons like a bunch of kindergartners.

Breaking out Just Dance (which was child's play for these girls, since all of them dancing here are on the Varsity Pom team.)

Samson, still waiting for handouts.

The next day, Yours Truly was waking up by playing some video games in bed, and the dog decided to join me (he'll burrow under blankets and lie like this for HOURS.)

Later on in the week, Midland High (and Dow High) had its seniors visit their previous schools - some sort of tradition they've held for years, where they'll group kids together on buses based on which elementary school they went to, and send them over to tour their old stomping grounds one, final time. Kind of a 'going full circle' sorta thing. I think it's super cool, and wish I could've walked around Clare Primary School one last time before graduating. 

I had to work when they did this, but Kris was able to buzz over on her lunch break and catch Alayna touring Chestnut Hill Elementary with Cristina and the rest of the former-Chipmunks.

The high schoolers toured their old classrooms, the gym, library, cafeteria, etc. before marching out to applause from all their former teachers.

Again, I would have loved to have done this - such a cool experience, bringing it all back around to the beginning one last time.

Mrs. Larson, Alayna's 2nd Grade Teacher (a rock star, and one of the best teachers our kids ever had) came out of retirement for this event, which was super badass of her.

Posing in front of the old sign.

(. . .and again, with Cristina.)

Following their final tour of Chestnut Hill, the seniors re-boarded their bus and shuttled over to Northeast Middle School, where they did the exact same thing again, just this time with Middle School. . .

Marching out, an hour or two later.

Kris had to head back to work by this point in time, but Cristina'as mom, Ana, was nice enough to get some pics of our kids together (including this one in front of the ol' obelisk.)

Lexi, Cristina, and the Cannonball

The Seniors (kinda funny how some Dow kids got in there - some kids switched schools along the way, as most kids who go to Northeast continue on to MHS.)

Ordered a Black Flag hoodie off Depop this month, and the guy who shipped it to me threw in some. . . Pokemon cards. For some reason.

The Johnsons invited us over to their place for a driveway fire that Friday evening (the pic taken from their security camera, letting us know they were all ready for company to arrive.)

Both of us were down for a chill hangout, we've been burning the candle at both ends for awhile and a large get-together with the whole crew would have been too much.

We hung out there until midnight or so, then called it a night. 

Abby and her boyfriend, Logan, were going through some old photo albums in our basement, and stumbled across one of my college albums (which probably isn't good). They found a pic of me from back in the day, back in like 2002 or so, when I had liberty spikes, and he took a pic of it to post to one of his social media apps. So I guess I'm famous now. . .

Later that evening, me and the other DnD Dewdz had ourselves another session of dork-ass adventuring.

This one only ended up being like three and a half hours in length, because Russell had to go suddenly, but still super fun.

The day's weather was gorgeous, so Abby spent most of the late morning/early afternoon bronzing in the backyard.

After I got home from the gym, I joined Kris in the backyard to work on some landscaping (also taking advantage of the awesome weather.)

The backyard, slowly but surely coming together. Words cannot begin to describe to all of you how excited I am that Summer is here again. Hopefully once the dust settles from this month - and once we clear the last gauntlet of Alana's Open House and our family trip down to Tennessee the following week - we'll have some down time in which we can thoroughly enjoy int.

- Brian